Hello everyone, my name is Public_Agenda. I would like to start by thanking my opponent for offering this interesting debate that is sure to provide a welcome relief from the strict and intense debates normally offered on this site. He has brought up the most interesting topic, "I am Inexperienced debater," which I take to mean, "Resolved: I am an inexperienced debater."

As the con, it is my duty to prove this resolution false, and thus to prove that he is not an inexperienced debater. I do not, however, have to prove that he is experienced. Just simply that he is not inexperienced. Which means if he falls into that gray area somewhere between experienced and inexperienced, I still win.

I accept the burden of proof for this debate.

To begin, I would like to define two terms for the sake of this debate.

Inexperienced – Lacking in sufficient experience to consider oneself at an upper level of proficiency in a particular event or set of knowledge.

Debater – A person involved in a formal system or argumentation that uses knowledge, logic, and evidence to disprove the claim of another while proving his or her own claim.

If you cross-apply these definitions to one another, you come to the conclusion that my opponent is trying to prove that he lacks the experience necessary to be proficient in formal argumentation. I will be arguing that he has the experience necessary to be proficient in formal argumentation, but rather simply lacks the skill. I will be proving this through the following contentions:

1)Lacking experience is different from lacking skill.

2)My opponent has initiated many debates with professional, skillfully created resolutions.

3)My opponent's typical arguments in a debate are short, but effectively summarize his points and are intelligent in design.

4)My opponent could easily be faking his inexperience for the sake of this debate.

I will be proving the first two contentions in this round, and the last two in the next round as well as strengthening my first two. I will rebut if necessary, but I doubt I will need to as my opponent will probably not provide any counterarguments, because if he does he proves his own resolution negative. A strong rebuttal is a sign of an experienced debater, after all.

Contention #1: Lacking experience is different from lacking skill.

The definition I set forth for inexperienced is "lacking sufficient experience to consider oneself at an upper level of proficiency," which would suggest that inexperience in debate is defined by lacking proficiency in debate. However, this is not true. My definition simply says that one is inexperienced when he does not have the experience to be proficient. This does not mean that having this experience would make my opponent a good debater, though.

Experience is not the only thing required to be a good debater. Skill is also required. And although skill can be acquired through experience, not every experienced person gains skill. Therefore, my opponent could be quite experienced but still be a poor debater. So do not be misled by his losing streak; this does not mean he is inexperienced. It just means he currently lacks skill, which doesn't always correlate to experience.

Contention #2: My opponent has initiated many debates with professional, skillfully created resolutions.

A resolution is the topic of a debate. For example, as con I am trying to disprove the resolution of this debate, which is that the Pro side is an inexperienced debater. My opponent has been involved in 6 debates before this one (which in itself shows he has had plenty of opportunities to gain experience). He initiated 5 of those debates himself. It is much harder to start your own debate than it is to take someone else's, as you must think of a good, creative topic and then write the introduction. My opponent has done this 5 times, and done a rather successful job of it each time.

The topics of all 5 debates he started, with the exception of one, were detailed and gave a complete idea of what the debate would involve. There is no question as to how the debate should proceed, nor is there confusion in the wording. The topics also create a clear Pro side and a clear Con side, allowing for good, fun, successful debate. These are integral parts of good debate, and are skills experienced debaters almost always learn during the course of their experience.

Here are two examples of his topics:

1)Marijuana should not be legalized.

While simple, this debate has a clear pro and con side. Pro will be arguing that marijuana should not be legalized, and con will argue that it should be legalized. The argument also facilitates a necessity by both sides to research and present facts, as the argument spans multiple dimensions, encompassing economy, society, politics, philosophy, and morality. All of this set in a situation where the debater may use up to 8,000 characters per round over 3 rounds creates a deep and complex debate, all from a simple topic created from the mind of an obviously experienced debater.

The other example is:

2)The Russian PPSH-41 was a more effective weapon than the American Thompson sub machine gun.

This is obviously a very well thought out topic that provides each person with a predefined standpoint. Both debaters would have to be very well researched to argue this point, and this debate can also span multiple dimensions. One gun can be more effective in multiple things, including accuracy, firepower, reload time, costs, production time, weight, and more. Thus, the debate takes on an element of which gun gives greater benefit in comparison to the costs. Once again, a good topic from an experienced debater. And all of this has come from THE_OPINIONATOR.

In conclusion for this round, I would like to ask you to review the logic in my arguments and thing of how much you know I'm right, and how I'm obviously fighting a Straw man argument where I'm bound to lose, so you should vote for me just to defy that! So, stay tuned for the amazingness of round 2! :D

My opponent has set up a very good argument in witch I will try to disprove.

1.Lacking experience is different from lacking skill.

I have no experience in debating except for this debate site and debates I have engaged my own debate team in. I feel that it is the other way around what if I have skill I just lack experience in using that skill? Think of this a man joins the army and he fires his weapon in basic and then is thrown into combat. He has the skill of firing the weapon, but he lacks the experience of shooting it in combat. The man would hesitate in firing at a live human being because he has never shot to kill. Think of me as the man and debating as the gun. I have the skill to debate in training but, lack the skill to debate when it really counts.

2. My opponent has initiated many debates with professional, skilfully created resolutions.

I may set up proper and proffesional resolutions but again I have the skill to use this to my advantage but I lack the experience. Both the opponents in my two previous debates have more experience in using the skill that they have acquired in debating. You can have as much skill as you want but when it comes down to it if you have no experience using it than it is not useful.

3)My opponent's typical arguments in a debate are short, but effectively summarize his points and are intelligent in design.

If my arguments are so short and summarized points and are intelligent in design, then why do I consistently lose debates to other opponents? I say again I have the skill but lack of experience in using that skill. My debate arguments are filled with parts of a subject that has nothing to do with the actual debate.

4)My opponent could easily be faking his inexperience for the sake of this debate.

If I were hiding my inexperience just for the sake of a debate I would have won alot more than just one debate on this site. This would be a great strategy for one to use such as faking being shot to have your enemy to come closer to finish him off.

I ask the readers of this debate to read all arguments and make up there own opinions based on our arguments.

As it seems my opponent probably isn't "faking" any sort of inexperience (this would take a good deal of skill, which as I have said before he most likely lacks), I will instead focus on proving that my opponent does have experience.

First, I will re establish that my opponent lacks skill, not experience. He has said that it may be the other way around, that he may lack experience and not skill. But in that case, we would have a stronger win record than he does. From my own experience, an inexperienced but skilled person is still very effective at debate. In general, debate skill comes in the form of being able to provide logical arguments, being aggressive in your argumentation, and disproving your opponent's arguments through logical means. Even without the experience to know the structure of debate, a person who can do these three things can still win. My first debate event ever was in Sophomore year. I had no experience with debate whatsoever, but I won 2nd place in my debate event. I've seen similar events occur with other inexperienced debaters, even when they get placed in debates open to all levels of experience.

Thus, once again, my opponent lacks skill, not experience. If he had skill and simply lacked experience, he would provide more logical points.

Beyond that, my opponent just proved that he has had plenty of past experience. He has been in at least six debates on this site before this one, meaning he's debated multiple times and has a firm grasp on the proceedings of a debate. He also stated that he is in a debate team and has debated with them, once again showing experience in debating.

In defense of my second contention, presenting a proper topic is something that comes from experience, not skill. Skill does not teach you how to structure a topic, because it is a formality learned with experience. Thus, my opponent's rebuttal is invalid.

I have not even expanded upon my third contention, yet my opponent has already made an attempt to rebut it. This is called making an "argument block," a way to make an argument invalid before it is even presented. This is another thing learned with experience, not skill, as a skilled debater would still be unsure if he was supposed to block an argument before it was presented. Once again, my opponent is experienced.

To expand upon my third contention and rebut his rebuttal, the contention is that my opponent's arguments are presented in an effectively summarized way and are intelligent in design, not that they are logical or good. Simply put, my opponent's arguments may be extremely ineffective in actually proving his point, or may be filled with off-topic points, but they are structures in a way indicative of experience. He does not drone on in a way that bores his readers. Summarization such as this is an effective tool typically employed my seasoned veterans of the debating world. Even I, if you haven't noticed, am very poor at summarizing my points. He structures his arguments also into a few paragraphs, each paragraph representing one major points, rather than going all over the place. Hence, intelligent in design, even if his arguments are full of logical fallacies. A sign of experience, even if the skill is absent.

In conclusion, I have effectively proved that my opponent is experienced. First, I proved that my opponent lacks skill, and that is the reason for his poor debating record. Second, I showed that he has initiated many debates with professional, skillfully created resolutions. And third, I've proved that he effectively summarizes his points in an intelligently structured way. All of these are signs of experience, regardless of skill level. They have nothing to do with skill. Before I conclude, I would like to apologize to my opponent for my aggression and possible disrespect. The topic necessitated that I prove him unskilled, and thus my disrespect originated from that. So finally, I have proved that my opponent is an experienced debater. Please vote for the negative.